“It is the height of irresponsibility for Nazri to give assurance of protection under a law which does not exist” – YB Kit.

That is why when you clarified in the earlier thread that you were “not aware of either Witness Protection Act or Witness Protection”, I was perplexed how could the Witness Protection Bill be tabled, without the Leader of Opposition being informed about it? Now you further clarified that “there are no signs that the government is ready to present a Witness Protection Bill to Parliament”.

That’s a grave misrepresentation by a supposedly responsible minister to the public via the media isn’t it?

Are they so desperate as misrepresent as to facts?

Some more the honourable minister had reportedly said, as reported on front page of NST today, “As such it is important for them (meaning Anwar/PKR) to reveal the source, failing which we can only conclude that they are lying….”.

However as I have said before and would say again the determination of the authenticity of the video clip is forensic in character (by forensic image authentication and spectrographic voice identification) which can be proceeded upon independently of the maker of the video clip confirming he made it.

The Minister further said that “My assurance is that we have an Act to protect them (the witnesses) … if we don’t believe in the Government, who would we trust?” but the question remains for the public, how do believe the government that says that there is protection for witnesses under a Bill or an Act where none actually presently exists? :)

The relevance of Witness Protection programme is to protect witnesses, who are prepared to testify for the government against criminals and gangsters and mobsters against the latter’s reprisals such protection usually in form of placing the witness in the hands of the government for secret relocation and arrangement of new identity. How does this Witness Protection programme apply where the testimony here (on the video clip) is against (not gangsters/mobsters) but the government and government’s officials themselves? It is like placing one’s protection in the very hands of those who have the greatest motivation to neutralise that person. The proper assurance to trade with the Lingamgate Whistle blower/ video clip maker is not, as what Nazri alleged, the Witness Protection Bill – which to date has not even been tabled and read in Parliament, much less passed as law and gazetted – but a public guarantee by the government to the whistleblower of a blanket immunity from any prosecution or civil suits under any law for testifying before the Haidar’s Panel of Enquiry.

“Hello Mr Whistleblower, your life is in danger” – Scooter said.

I don’t think it’ll come to that because the case, on further reflection, may be a little bit more complicated than we have thought…..

The video clip available now on Internet is but a copy of the original. I guess authenticity of video clip may be presumed if the parties alleged to be in it – ie the senior lawyer and the senior judge – own up, say, yes they were the ones on the phone. Here the judge said he was not the one.

No problem again if the senior lawyer admitted he was the one, which leaves in contention only the question of who was the other one on the phone not captured on the video clip. Again here no problem if lawyer said judge was the one considering the context and contents of the conversation against the actual subsequent events relating to judicial appointments, which corroborate what was said on the mobile phone.

Problem arises where both senior lawyer and judge say that the video clip was not real. They say that copies were disseminated by the Opposition camp that has a political agenda to discredit the administration. They say that the images have been superimposed and modified. They say the voice and manner of speaking though sounding like Lingam was someone else’s who had practiced to perfection the way the lawyer normally speak and sound. The images were captured in some other context of the lawyer speaking on the mobile phone. The images are in any case too blur to read his lips movements to check against what’s audible of the conversation. What then?

As possibilities of superimposition of images and imitation of voice and style of speaking exist, the video clip should be technically authenticated as recording what purportedly happened in 2002.

For authentication to take place, the panel of enquiry would require: -

(1) the mobile cameraperson who took the video clip to be a witness to confirm that he actually videotaped the events;

(2) just in case mobile cameraperson had an agenda to discredit the lawyer and judge, there is a need for another witness to the event to confirm that the cameraman was indeed video taping;

(3) but that’s enough, as the cameraman could have doctored or modified the contents videotaped, cameraman must produce the original camera phone for expert technical examination;

(4) only then after witnesses have first surfaced as in (1) to

(5), then only technical experts (whether locally or from FBI) will be called in to examine the forensics of the mobile camera and examine if the mobile camera has any memory or any digital audit trail or water mark to confirm that the images from the copies circulated in the internet had been processed through this particular mobile/camera belonging to the whistle blower in 2002.

(6) Now it will be recalled that other ways of checking the phone records of the lawyer implicated requires Telco’s records in 2002. At that time, the Telcoms did not keep records. If they did, they could lose them without anyone knowing the better.

(7) OK, next we ask for the lawyer’s mobile phone to examine whether there is a digital/audit trail going back to 2002.
Now there is probably none but even if there were, the lawyer might have owned several such mobile phones, so what is there to stop him from producing another mobile that he didn’t use on that particular occasion? From the copies – or even original of images – could anyone make out the type or brand of mobile phone he was using on that occasion? I don’t think so.

So on the basis of the above, I think, up to now, the persons accused still have the upper hand to bury the scandal – and not just because they are protected by the powers to be.

Can one imagine how long it would take to go through the steps above? Probably two general elections!

I was just exaggerating about 2 GEs. It will take longer than the time of (I think) 1 month allotted to the Haidar Special Panel to conclude their findings and certainly extend beyond the retirement date of senior judge. What is in part the a real problem is the challenge of digital technology, its growing at the pace faster than the slow evolving traditional rules of fact finding and evidence gathering that the legal system could cope and adapt.

What Datuk Seri Mohamed Nazri Aziz had said about the Witness Protection Bill/Act had seriously misled the public. He should retract and correct the mistatement.

According to reseraches made with the Legal Division of the Parliament, PKR president Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail confirmed that that no such bill as the Witness Protection Bill had been tabled for a first reading in the Lower House of Parliament.

The only bill which was tabled, debated and passed by the Lower House two sessions ago was the Evidence of Child Witness Bill 2007. The Evidence of Child Witness Bill 2007 provides for the giving of evidence by child witnesses which may be given in a combination of manners including video recording of the child’s evidence (away from the court) or in in court separated by a screen or other arrangement put up to prevent a child witness from seeing or be seen by the accused or for media to publish the picture or name of child witness (by definition below 16).

Surely the honourable minister could not be taken to impute that the witness who took the video clip of Lingam’s conversation was a child.

In the premises the Minister must be either misrepresenting the facts or genuinely confused between The Evidence of Child Witness Bill 2007 on one hand and the Witness Protection Bill or Act on the other hand.

Nazri, a trained lawyer is also the minister in charge of legal affairs in the government and ought not to get confused between Evidence of Child Witness Bill 2007 and Witness Protection Bill. He must be aware that to do so (get confused) will be a negative reflection from the public perspective of ministerial competence and by extension the government’s criteria of ministerial appointment. :)